Kissed by Shadows (Kissed by Shadows Series, Book 1)

by Lola StVil

  Quinn found solace in the dream that she could reunite her family. But one day when she headed to her dad’s house for an unexpected visit, she found him in the arms of a witch by the name of Katharine. It signified the end of Quinn’s family. So, Quinn changed her focus. She decided instead of trying to fix her family, she was going to destroy someone else’s. She set out to cause Disney as much hurt and pain as possible.

  She began to study blood magic, but not just in theory, like she had before with her dad. She wanted to try real-world applications. She was particularly into a book called The Book of Impossible Spells. On one of her rare trips home, Sadie found that book in Quinn’s possession.

  She should have bound her powers, right then and there. But she loved her daughter and knew what could happen to powerless witches in the Shadow world. They were easy prey to any number of dangers. So, she let Quinn keep her powers. However, because Quinn was found experimenting with such lethal spells, Sadie cased a spell that would prevent Quinn from ever causing death to Disney or her family.

  But Sadie underestimated the amount of anger her daughter was feeling. And when Akio married his new girlfriend, it renewed Quinn’s hatred for Disney. She refocused her revenge. She decided to go after Disney’s mother: an eye for eye.

  She used a spell, one she had memorized from the impossible spell book. It’s called Devil’s song because the victim begs for death and cries out; their cries like music to the devil. The spell was rooted to two things: finding an object worn by the victim and the rage of the being who cast it. But Quinn could not cast it thanks to Sadie. In fact, anytime she tried, it fizzed and became as lethal as a bottle of soda.

  That was also around the time that Langston had tried the very last witch in the Shadow world and every one of them said they could not wake her boyfriend up. Hearing that he would be in coma forever was beyond devastating for Langston.

  The two of them were talking one evening, and Langston expressed her rage with the witch that doomed her boyfriend. Quinn realized it was almost as intense as her own feelings for Disney. She placed Langston under a spell and commanded her to make the Devil’s song spell. When it was ready, they waited for Amy to get out of work and head to the park. There, Quinn bewitched Langston and made her think that Amy was really Kelis, the witch who had cursed her boyfriend. Quinn is a very capable witch from a strong line of witches. It was easy for her to create that illusion for Langston.

  Thinking she was attacking her enemy, Langston tackled Amy to the ground, took out the red vial filled with homemade poison, and spread it all over Amy’s face. Quinn then ordered Langston to speak the words that would kill Amy.

  Sadie was keeping track of Amy and got suspicious when she didn’t come home. Sadie soon tracked Amy to the park. There, she found both Langston and Amy crying out in unimaginable pain. Quinn, shocked at the side effects and horrified by what she had done, tried to help them both. But nothing she did worked.

  What Quinn didn’t realize was that the spells in that book aren’t “impossible” because they are hard to create, they are called “impossible” because they force you to make decisions that are cruel and, yes, almost impossible.

  And one of the side effects of Devil’s song is that whatever is happening to the victim will also happen to the being that cast it, so the only way to cause that much pain to anyone is if you hate them enough that you would do the same to yourself. Sadie knew that she could save one of them or lose them both. In the end, because Langston was a powerful angel and important to the mission, she chose to help her and let Amy die.

  Sadie bawled over Amy’s body like it was her own child. The worst part was, Amy was still alive—not enough to be saved—just enough to keep suffering. So, Sadie, unable to do what was needed herself, called in Talon. She also needed him to think that it was all his doing, so she created an illusion that took away any evidence of a spell. Talon came, and Sadie watched from afar as Talon officially ended Amy’s life. When it was over, he did what his client, Sadie, asked—he made it look like a robbery gone bad.

  When she got back home, Quinn was inconsolable. She hadn’t thought about the consequences of making a spell like that. The shock and grief over what she had done made her hysterical. Sadie used a spell that took her memory of the event away; she did the same thing to Langston. In the end, she blamed herself because she knew she should have bound Quinn’s powers.

  “Whatever happened after that is all my fault. Had I taken Quinn’s power away, none of this would have happened,” she said to me earlier, with tears in her eyes.

  Sadie may have blamed herself, but when Disney comes out of the memory, all she will take with her is the knowledge that Quinn used Langston as a tool to kill her mother. How the hell is Disney going to deal with that? I don’t have to wait long to find out—Disney reappears, and the mirror she stepped out of fades away. I look into her eyes and I can only see one thing—wrath in the form of actual flames. Lots of flames.

  Oh shit!

  “Disney, wait. Let’s talk—”

  She waves her hands and sends a sea of fire right for me…

  ***

  I am catapulted to the other side of the alley. She doesn’t even turn to watch my fall. She’s only interested in one thing: getting to Quinn. She marches into the bookstore and seconds later, the front window explodes out in a blast of heat, glass, and torched pages. And in a move worthy of a witch with ten times her power, a gust of gale-force wind literally shoves out all her friends. Mason, Regal, Langston, Perry, and Saudia—their bodies are just tossed out of the store and across the street, where they collide against the side of a parked bus.

  Within the wrecked store, Atlas has her back to me, arms raised, and I can just make out Quinn on her knees amidst the spreading flames. This isn’t the Disney I know, this is Atlas; and Atlas has Quinn in her sights.

  Oh, this is not good.

  The team, taken aback by what’s happening, calls out to her to try and calm her down. But when they touch her, she shoos them away with the gust of a thousand winds. She turns her attention back to Quinn.

  “You took away the only family I had, you bitch!” Atlas rages as she lifts her hand and sends a surge of flames down on Quinn. At the last moment, Quinn manages to block the flames with a chant.

  “Atlas, what’s wrong? What did I do?” Quinn asks as she seeks cover.

  “You killed her!” Atlas shouts.

  “What? Killed who? What are you talking about?” Langston shouts as she gets up and tries to reason with her.

  “You got it wrong. Whatever you think I did, I didn’t do,” Quinn cries out.

  “Don’t talk to me, witch; talk to the flames!” she says as she sends a sea of fire swirling over Quinn’s head, ready to engulf her. Quinn is in defense mode; she creates yet another shield, deflecting the winds still roaring around inside the store.

  Atlas casually reaches back and makes a flicking motion with her hand—and just as Mason and the others are recovering, ready to charge back to help, a wall of thick ice builds and covers the broken window and seals up the whole front of the store.

  Damn!

  Now I can’t see a thing, but I know that wall won’t stop this group for long. Mason could punch through it pretty quick. So I’ve got to move. I dart across the space overhead and land on the bookstore’s roof. In moments, I’m through the attic space and onto the second level. I’m trying to get into a good position so I can reach her and teleport her out before she has her Break and turns into a demon. If she gets her hands on Quinn and kills her, it’s over. Atlas will be…like me.

  The store’s full of billowing smoke, the heat’s intensifying, and I can sense the flames climbing and leaping from shelf to shelf below. This whole place is going to be ash pretty soon, but boring old books aren’t my concern.

  Quinn’s trying to hide herself behind the coffee counter. The shield is still working, blocking shards of ice Atlas flings at her. With just her powers, Disney’s extracting foot-lo
ng spears from her ice wall and hurling them at Quinn, all the while screaming at her. She looks like a vision of unparalleled destruction. Her eyes completely white, hair wild and flailing in the wind, completely in tune with all the elements, she’s directing the ice and the wind, even the flames.

  “For my mother!” she yells again and again, making throwing motions with her arms. The icicle spears keep forming and flying through the air, until it’s like a storm of ice rips horizontally around Atlas, pummeling Quinn’s shield.

  The barrier flickers with each impact, and it’s clear Quinn’s struggling to keep it at full strength as the ice shatters around her and the flames are closing in. She may be screaming something, some plea for Atlas to stop, but I can’t hear it over Atlas’s shrieks of rage and shattering ice and roaring flames.

  The inferno is spreading from the opposite side of the ice, and I worry for a moment that Atlas doesn’t see it, and she’s going to be caught and burnt up. But no, she’s got that covered.

  As the fire raging on the closest bookshelf threatens to spread onto her, she waves both hands in that direction—and the composition of elements changes immediately. Fire becomes super-heated water, and in a blast of hissing steam, it’s like someone just opened a valve to pour a thousand gallons over the front of the room.

  Quinn seizes on the distraction and leaps onto the counter; she extends her arms and points at the wet floor under Atlas. Vibrational energy rips from her fingertips. The ground shakes, the wood splinters, and the concrete cracks and disintegrates, opening a huge hole to the basement.

  Atlas just gives a mocking laugh, as she’s now floating on a gust of wind she’s called up. The breeze moves her up higher, almost to my level. But she doesn’t see me, still only focused on Quinn.

  “Atlas, please.” Quinn’s got her hands up behind the weakened and fizzling shield. “This isn’t you. And whatever you think I did, I didn’t…”

  Oh no.

  Atlas roars, “Liar!” She directs the wind to drop her down right behind Quinn. Then she spreads out her arms to the fire-engulfed shelves on either side, and does the same thing—turning the flames to scalding water; and with a clapping motion, she brings her hands together. The waves come crashing forward, meeting right at Quinn.

  Her shield sparkles and fizzles as the flood pours through it, countering the electrical pulses, scattering the shield, and then shocking and disorienting Quinn. She falls back hard, soaked and screaming in pain, her flesh sizzling.

  Suddenly, the ice wall shudders and cracks. Mason’s fist punches through, creating a huge hole, and then Regal’s trying to climb through.

  “Quinn!” He tries to pull her free with his telekinesis, but Atlas again makes a dismissive move with her hand, and a massive gust of wind rips through what’s left of the ice wall and hurls everybody back out into the street in a pile of ice chunks. They are working their way out of it but it will take time, which is part of Atlas’s plan.

  Atlas leaps onto the floor, standing over Quinn, who’s still coughing up water and trying to see through the scalding steam. Her eyes are red, skin blistered and raw. I’m sure she can’t see a thing, and can’t focus enough to defend herself.

  Atlas raises her hands behind her head, and instantly water condenses, then solidifies into ice, creating a long spear she grips tight. Atlas holds the spear with both hands, high above her head, and plunges it down on Quinn’s body with brute strength, unlike anything I’ve ever witnessed. Quinn is dead—in a fraction of second, she’s gonna be dead. I don’t know if I can get to Quinn in time, but I dive in front of her in hopes of stopping the icy blade from puncturing Quinn’s chest.

  “No!” I shout as I leap to Quinn’s defense and use my body as a shield. My sudden movement throws Atlas off, and she lands the blade right into my shoulder.

  FUUUCK!

  It hurts but it doesn’t kill me, and more importantly, it doesn’t kill the witch. Atlas, realizing what I have done, glares at me and says in a voice so filled with ire I don’t recognize it, “GET THE FUCK OUT MY WAY!!!”

  “No! You can’t.”

  “You care about this bitch?”

  “No, she can die in hell for all I care. But not by you, it can’t be by your hands. Atlas—Disney—please. This will be your Break. You have a chance to do what’s right despite how just you are in your anger. If you kill her, you won’t come back from it. You will be a monster. You will be like me. But you’re not me; you’re stronger. This life can bend and twist you until you go crazy. But don’t let this world break you. Don’t break. Don’t break.”

  She looks me in the eye, and her rage begins to melt away. It’s replaced by unfathomable sorrow. She looks over at Quinn and pleads with her.

  “Ohmygodohmygodohmygod. Why Quinn, why? Why did you take her from me? She was all I had. You should have killed me instead. You were mad at me; you should have killed me instead. Not my mom, Quinn, not my mom…”

  Atlas crumbles to the floor and cries out, but her pain is so deep that no actual sound comes out of her mouth. When she cries out a second time, she makes a sound like a wounded animal. Her whole body is shaking with grief and sorrow. She holds her hands across her stomach as if she’s afraid she’ll literally come apart. An endless stream of tears runs down her tortured face. Her body is rocked by uncontrollable sobs, each one striking a blow to my chest. I rip the spear from my shoulder, ignore the pain, and crawl towards her.

  “It’s okay, Princess. It’s okay,” I promise her as I place my hand on the side of her face and wipe the tears away. She shakes. She’s in hell; therefore, so am I.

  “What can I do? Huh? Look at me,” I plead as I turn her face towards me. We make eye contact and her pain is undeniable.

  “Disney, what can I do? Baby, how can I make it better?”

  “Kill Quinn.”

  I look at her but the truth is, I don’t really need to see her face to know she’s serious. Her tone is deadly and certain. Her eyes are wild with hate, and even though she’s no longer in “nuclear” mode, she is still seething. I have no problem taking Quinn out. In fact, I think she deserves to be put down. But this isn’t about Quinn. It’s about another girl: Atlas. And there’s no way she will be okay with what she’s asking for a few days from now.

  “Disney, I can’t do that.”

  “Yes, you can. You’re the Keysu. The team is still trapped in the cube of ice, hurry! Do it now.”

  “That’s not the reason. I can’t kill Quinn because it’s not what you really want.”

  “Yes, it is. I’m telling you. End her life!”

  “I know what she did was wrong, and I get how much it’s hurting you, but this isn’t what you really want.”

  “Are you fucking kidding me?! All this time you have gone around killing anything that moves and the one time I tell you to take someone out, you refuse? I thought you loved me?”

  “I do, baby. I do. But you don’t want to do this.”

  “That bitch orchestrated my mother’s death. And then watched as she died on the ground like an animal. You have to kill her, Liam, please. Please,” she begs as she sobs.

  “If I kill her and you change your mind later, you’ll hate me, and worse, you’ll hate yourself. I can’t do that to you.”

  “NO! THIS IS WHAT I WANT! SHE TOOK AWAY THE ONLY FAMILY I HAD LEFT.”

  “You have me, Princess, I’m here.”

  “Are you going to kill her?” she asks sincerely.

  “No,” I reply.

  “Then get out of here,” she demands.

  “Disney…”

  “GET OUT! STAY AWAY FROM ME. YOU’RE USELESS! I HATE YOU! I HATE YOU!”

  There is no need to argue, I can see it her eyes, and she does hate me. She does want me gone. I know she’ll be okay because the team is free now and headed for us. I look down at her before I take off.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “GO TO HELL!” she rages as I take off into the air. I land in New Orleans, just outside of Pest�
��s home. I don’t go straight inside; instead I lean on the wall of his house and close my eyes.

  “Oh no, is she mad at you? Did you kill a member of her team?” Pest asks as he comes around the corner.

  “No. She asked me to kill someone and I didn’t.”

  “What happened?” he asks. I explain everything to him, and like me, he’s having a hard time processing.

  “Sadie is…complicated,” Pest says.

  “Yeah, she’s not the only one.”

  “Atlas didn’t really mean she hated you. She’s just upset.”

  “The one thing I know how to do is kill, and yet, I said no.”

  “Because you were saying yes to the girl you know she is and not giving in to the terrorist who had taken over her body. You know in Egyptian times . . .” he starts, but stops in the middle.

  “Go ahead, what about Egyptian times?” I ask.

  “You want to hear me lecture? Wow, this is worse than I thought. Come inside, get a drink,” Pest says. I follow him up the stairs.

  He grabs me six or so bottles of Sum. I drink them back to back. We spend the next few hours together. Pest doesn’t say much. I’m glad. Silence works for me. The first person to break it, however, is me.

  “You think she’s okay?”

  “Yeah, the team will look out for her,” Pest says.

  “Yeah, she has them; and Mason,” I reply bitterly.

  “I’ll also check on her. I had to anyway, we are taking a jam making class together next month, and she agreed to get the jars.”

  “Okay, I’m not drunk enough to tackle that. Look, Pest, I came to ask for your Tusk blade.”

  “That’s a blade to remove sacred markings—are you saying…?”

  “Yeah, I’m going to cut out the mark of Keysu from my wings. I will no longer be Keysu.”

  “Wow…no one has ever done that before. Do you know what Arken could do to you?” Pest asks.

  “Can’t be worse than having Disney tell me she hates me.”

  Pest sighs sadly and fetches me the small black box with the blade that can cut through bone. Before I go, he hugs me. I’m guessing it’s because he knows Arken will most likely kill me before he can see me again. It’s the first time he’s ever done that. It’s awkward and uncomfortable but I don’t say anything.